Naughty Dog working on two “brand-new experiences” besides Last of Us PS4

Start / News / Naughty Dog working on two “brand-new experiences” besides Last of Us PS4

May 16, 2014

Uncharted and The Last of Us developer Naughty Dog has two "brand-new experiences" in the works in addition to The Last of Us Remastered, according to the studio's Neil Druckmann.

In an interview with Edge discussing Remastered, Druckmann, creative director of The Last of Us, expressed some thoughts on seeing games and movies re-released when a new generation of consoles or disc formats comes out. Talking about "looking at a DVD versus Blu-ray, he said, "It's not a totally brand-new experience, but when you're seeing the film, the clarity of the image is much closer to how the director and the team initially saw it. There's something nice about that. I think if there was nothing but remakes, that would be pretty sad for the console. Just like any system out there, any medium, it's going to be a mixture."

And Naughty Dog will be helping to provide that mixture on the PlayStation 4. "We're working on this re-release, but at the same time we're working on two other brand-new experiences," Druckmann said. "When Blu-ray came out, the first thing is you buy all these re-releases of movies that you've loved, and then you see Gravity and you can't wait to see it on your Blu-ray. There's always room for a mixture of old and new."

Aside from The Last of Us Remastered, the only project Naughty Dog is known to be working on is the new Uncharted game for PS4, which is presumably one of the two new experiences Druckmann mentioned. Whatever the other "experience" might be--assuming it is a game--as a Sony subsidiary, Naughty Dog is undoubtedly working on it for PlayStation systems.

Before becoming best known for the Uncharted series, Naughty Dog was the developer behind the Crash Bandicoot and Jak and Daxter series. Prior to developing The Last of Us, Naughty Dog seriously considered making a new Jak and Daxter game before deciding it would be doing "everybody a disservice" with the game it would end up making--a decision that led to the studio working on The Last of Us. And while the possibility of a future Jak game being developed wasn't completely ruled out, co-president Evan Wells didn't sound optimistic about the chances back in 2012.

"Naughty Dog's got a long history, and I think it's got a long future, so to say we'll never go back is kind of crazy," he said at the time. "It's still up in the air, but I wouldn't think that's going to happen because I think we'd run into all of the same problems with that team that we did with this team."

The new Uncharted in the works for PS4 does not yet have a name, but there have been rumors that gameplay footage will be shown at E3 next month. One thing we know for sure is that Todd Stashwick, who voiced the teaser trailer released last year and was set to play a "significant" role in the game, will not be involved. His role was recast after he followed former Uncharted creative director Amy Hennig to Visceral Games to work on its new Star Wars game.

Naughty Dog has shed a number of key staffers of late; in addition to Hennig, The Last of Us lead artist Nate Wells and Uncharted 4 director Justin Richmond have parted ways with the studio this year.

Now that we know it has a second new game in the works, what are you hoping to see from Naughty Dog? Let us know in the comments below.